Deals at Rite Aid

I have been couponing at Rite Aid this week. Here is the loot from one of my shopping trips. Before Coupons and rebates it would have cost me $28.00. With coupons and after the rebate all of this will have cost me $2.28.

Two of my favorite couponing websites are The Krazy Coupon Lady and Fabulessly Frugal. They break down all of the deals at several stores. Thank you Ladies for all of your hard work.

The Christmas Spirit

The Christmas Spirit

Another sweet video! Remember why we celebrate this Christmas Season

The Nativity

I love this video. It is so sweet. The music is moving and brings me goose-bumps.

The video: Nativity by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
The Song: Breath of Heaven by Amy Grant

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icilgwdHiZg

The Reason for the Season

My three year old nephew and I made this cute Nativity together. The templates can me found here. Thank you Catholic Icing! She has some other really great Christmas activities.

May we all find peace and joy in our Savior Jesus Christ this holiday season!

Weighty Matters

The pregnancy with my daughter was eventful, I was ill nearly every day of the first seven months. I dropped nearly 30 pounds by mid pregnancy. Needless to say when I was able to eat again, I ate! Not only did I eat, my body went into reserve mode making up for lost time. By the end of the pregnancy I had gained all that I had lost plus thirty pounds. I did this all the last two months of the pregnancy. When I gave birth to my daughter I weighed 200 lbs the day before I went into labor. The day when I got home from the hospital I weighted 180something. So with the birth I shed nearly 20 pounds. I was happy to see the numbers on the scale go down. The couple of months following her birth were stagnant. I tried to get out and go for walks and go to the gym, but with lack of sleep by the time my daughter was 4 months old I was in the high 180’s and now I have peaked around 200lbs again.

It has been a challenging thing for me. Being big and over weight is one thing. But not being able to wake up in the morning and get dressed is another thing. I only was able to wear my maternity clothing for the first couple of months after her birth. I didn’t have any thing else in my closet that would fit. I hit up a sale at Old Navy at their summer and was able to get several new pieces for my new plus size body. I think got 14 things for $20.00. What a blessing. I did not want to put any money into clothing that would soon be too big. The challenge now is that I am still in those big clothes. I riffle through my closet hoping something might fit better. No luck.

It isn’t like I haven’t tried to lose weight. I have. It isn’t that I haven’t tried to eat better. But what I can say, is that I earned those pounds. Every single one of them. It is almost as if I felt that I deserved to be able to eat all the junk food that I pleased for all of the sickness that I endured in my seven months of illness. My body turned on me, in defense it is storing up for some kind of calamity. Well the battle is on.

Last night I sat with the hubster and poured out my heart of how I do not want to be fat anymore. We talked of some plans of action and that it will probably take some baby steps to make it forward. I must say that there is great therapy in letting the tears flow.

I have the knowledge of what I need to do. I have always struggled with my weight and had to work very hard to maintain an average weight and pant size. I have the equipment or means to do it, with a gym membership as well as an elliptical and punching bag at home. I have the support. The one thing that needs some brushing up is the desire. That burning with in. The motivation and fire to go and not give up. I have had it. I have had it and failed, which created a greater wall to be overcome. I am getting there. In the past I have made a vision board. When things weren’t going as I would like in my life and wanted things to change, I put a visual to it. I made vision boards for 2007 and 2008. I also created a mission statement that was specific detailed, with my exact expectations. I can’t say that every single thing I pictured and wrote about came true. But I can say, that great miracles took place. I accomplished some really great things. I pictured and believed each one of them could happen, and they did! It wasn’t magic or just happenstance. It was the drive within me that was determined to create good things in my life. It was the child within that believed nothing is impossible and that I can overcome my fears and insecurities.

I still have it in me. I have just a little more flesh to dig deeper through, to get to that fire. So next week when I have some time off from my babysitting gig, I am going to get my vision board ready for my next journey in 2010. Great things are coming my way. I will overcome my cushy fleshy body!

So continuing on this path of post baby weight loss today I got out my swimsuit, a two piece tankini and put it on and took two full body shots. Oh, what a humbling moment it was, seeing a body I don’t recognize. I will be printing this picture so I can use it for motivation in taking my steps forward. I also took my measurements. Quite shocking to say the least, but one of the best things of motivation for me is to see those numbers go down, and to be able to fit in my pre-pregnancy clothing once again. I will overcome my weaknesses. I can say after my sob session last night that I did much better today. I made healthy choices in my eating and ate limited quantities. I made to the gym, although the workout was cut short due to running into an old acquaintance. That is a whole nother blog entry which I will share tomorrow if I get to it!

Cutting Teeth=Sleepless Nights

My sweet Lil’miss will be 8 months this week. Where has the time gone? She is on the verge of learning to crawl. She will get on all fours and rock. Sometimes there will be a toy in front of her and she will stretch and reach until her body gives in and down to the belly she goes. She has been at this same stage for over month now. The hubster is just dying for her to begin crawling. He pulls out the video camera each time she gets into position and cheers her on. We have many clips of her attempts not to crawl.

She is growing in so many ways. She has two teeth on bottom and four on top. Her top front teeth have just barely cut with the top I teeth poking through a couple of weeks ago.

She is a total social queen. She loves it when Baby J comes to play every afternoon. She jabbers and coos at him. He loves the attention, he is just a month younger than her and makes a great playmate, especially since their mobility is limited to rolling and some scooting backwards.

At family gatherings she beams like she is the center of the party, as she watches adults chat with one another and observes the older cousins running amuck. At church she is most content standing tall on my lap so she can look at all the people around us. She cocks her neck back and forth as she attempts to see those behind us trying to peer over my head. Ahh yes, she loves to be the center of attention, and oh how we love her so.

8 Months, to crawl or not to crawl...

My sweet Lil’miss will be 8 months this week. Where has the time gone? She is on the verge of learning to crawl. She will get on all fours and rock. Sometimes there will be a toy in front of her and she will stretch and reach until her body gives in and down to the belly she goes. She has been at this same stage for over month now. The hubster is just dying for her to begin crawling. He pulls out the video camera each time she gets into position and cheers her on. We have many clips of her attempts not to crawl.

She is growing in so many ways. She has two teeth on bottom and four on top. Her top front teeth have just barely cut with the top I teeth poking through a couple of weeks ago.

She is a total social queen. She loves it when Baby J comes to play every afternoon. She jabbers and coos at him. He loves the attention, he is just a month younger than her and makes a great playmate, especially since their mobility is limited to rolling and some scooting backwards.

At family gatherings she beams like she is the center of the party, as she watches adults chat with one another and observes the older cousins running amuck. At church she is most content standing tall on my lap so she can look at all the people around us. She cocks her neck back and forth as she attempts to see those behind us trying to peer over my head. Ahh yes, she loves to be the center of attention, and oh how we love her so.

Welcome to Domestica

Who am I…
A mom, wife, sister, aunt and friend.
A member of the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
A writer, a photographer,
a cook, a seamstress, a gardener.
An adventurer,
seeker, a dreamer.
A couponing, thrifty, cloth diapering momma.

So why the blog? I am a new mom who always dreamt of being a mom. The dreams started when I was a lil’miss. The memory is vivid. Four years old in my living room with a piano bench, blanket and doll. My best friend and I would take turns lying on the bench, stuff our shirts with the baby doll and quietly scream, not to draw too much attention to our selves as we would take turns being the mama in labor. Then the lil’miss or buckaroo would be wrapped up tight and we would go on with playing house.

We had a cassette tape at our house, I believe it was Young Mormon Children Sing. I loved singing the songs on that tape, especially the Mother song. The lyrics went like this….

"When I grow up I want to be a mother
And have a family
One little, two little, three little babies of my own
Of all the jobs, for me I'll choose no other
We'll have a family
Four little, five little, six little babies in my home
And I will love them all day long
And give them cookies and milk and yellow balloons
And cuddle them when things go wrong
And read them stories and sing them pretty tunes
When I grow up if I can be a mother
How happy I will be
One little, two little, three little babies I can love
And you will see each sister and each brother
Who look a lot like me
Four little, five little, six little blessings from above."

Click here for the recording.

It is as simple as that. I have wanted to be a mother ever since I have been a wee one. Now that I am that stay at home mom that I have dreamt of being I want to try out the rest of the domestic package that goes along with it. Cooking, sewing, gardening, cloth diapering etc.

This blog is dedicated to the journey of becoming a new mom who is thirty-something. I never imagined having my first child in my thirties. But I am oh so happy to have a lil’miss of my own.